Coconut Flour Pumpkin Spice Cake (SCD & GFCF)

I mentally wailed, but like Julia, did my best to keep a stiff upper lip about it – this cake was not gingerbread. Yesterday I had made the coconut flour gingerbread cake that I posted Wednesday with just coconut flour, making it nut-free. (Recipe originally used a combination of almond flour and coconut flour.) For some reason, the spices did not come across as strongly in the cake as when made with almond flour. Light and fluffy as chiffon, it had become pumpkin spice cake.

My personal misgivings were quickly extinguished, though, after my brother’s O.T. (Occupational Therapist) had tasted it, whom I had given a slice to. She’s from Australia and loves pumpkin spice, but she explained that it is hard to find there since Thanksgiving isn’t celebrated and pumpkin is used as a savoury food, not sweet, and pumpkin spice is usually imported when it appears at the cafes.

Practically speaking, this is a kissing cousin to the coconut flour gingerbread cake. This could be another gingerbread cake but I haven’t troubled myself yet to up the spices to make it gingerbread-y. Though only briefly musing in my last post, I am now seriously wondering about the role of pumpkin spice in pumpkin pie: is it really those spices I’m tasting and not so much the pumpkin when I’ve had the ocassion of eating a commercial or traditional (condensed milk and sugar) pumpkin pie? I’ll stop – this isn’t about pie, it’s about cake.

(If you’re wondering about the lone photo, I didn’t think I’d be blogging this version of the cake so I only took one, intending to just post it to my Flickr. Except for after adding the coconut flour and it being slightly lighter in colour, the batter looks very much the same as the gingerbread original.)

Speaking of cake, I feel oddly conflicted about blogging about cake when I think I should be doing more cookies, in the spirit of the season and seeing other bloggers and my bloggy friends doing cookies on their respective blogs – but the truth of the pudding is, I haven’t really done any Christmas cookie baking. Oh, I wish I have but I haven’t yet. Hopefully I will be able to amend that soon.

**Coconut cream is the fatty substance that rises to the top when the coconut milk has settled. To have this stuff on hand at all times, store at least a tin or two of full fat coconut milk (not lite) in the fridge.

Method:

Preheat oven to 350°F. Line a 9” round cake pan or springform pan with parchment paper.

Beat the egg yolks in a small stainless steel bowl with a whisk until light and pale and when visible trail (the ribbon) is left on the surface of the yolks before merging back when you lift the whisk. The consistency will resemble custard, with bubbles. When settled, there is a layer of foam on the top much like when egg whites are beaten. (I promise I’m going to make a new video soon demonstrating this.)

In a medium or large bowl, stir the honey and oil together until the honey is near creamed or begins to have a grainy appearance. Gently fold in the beaten egg yolks. The batter will take on a viscous consistency. Add the coconut milk or coconut cream, vanilla, and spices. All the while, make sure that you are stirring gently and slowly. Whisk in the coconut flour, stirring out any lumps in the batter. It will quickly thicken to a dough consistency, even after you’ve finished whisking and let it rest, but this is okay.

Beat the egg whites to soft peaks in a large bowl or in a food processor or other kitchen appliance. Gently fold into the batter: spreading the egg whites on top of the batter and cutting a rubber spatula down the middle to the bottom of the bowl and bringing up the dough-like batter over the egg whites. Repeat until there is no white left. Do not stir or mix, or else you may expel the air trapped in the whites. Gently stir in baking soda last.

Scrape batter into the prepared cake pan and bake for 30 to 45 minutes. When the cake is done, it should feel light and fluffy to the touch, almost as if there’s a foam underneath the surface, or when a knife or cake tester comes out clean from the centre. Thoroughly cool the cake before slicing to prevent the cake from cracking. The cake will start to feel more solid as it cools. Serve and enjoy!

14 thoughts on “Coconut Flour Pumpkin Spice Cake (SCD & GFCF)”

This was such a great, funny post! My “truth of the pudding” (great line by the way) is I had every intention of baking cookies this season and had things bookmarked, even tags at the ready but my get up and go just got up and went. I am relying on the kindness of my friend who did baking for me and as for enjoying kissing cousin’s.. unfortunately, Viggo Mortensen isn’t one of them otherwise this really would be a Christmas to remember 😉

Zoe, this post is too funny. And I wonder too, sometimes if it is all of the spices that make it pumpkin-y, or if it is the pumpkin itself. Either way, though, this cake actually sounds wonderful, especially only using the coconut flour. And I love the line about the cake being a kissing cousing…LOL

Hi Kim, regarding pumpkin: it’s definitely something that I think is worth investigating. Coconut flour on its own is really quite amazing – once you know how to use it properly, like anything, it works wonders!

So much fun going on with this post and in comments! 😉 I’m sure I would love this cake, Zoe. I just recently received my order of coconut flour and so far have only made Kelly’s (Spunky Coconut) vanilla bean cake, which was awesome. 🙂 She also makes a lot of treats using pumpkin spice versus the pumpkin itself. I love both the pumpkin and the pumpkin pie spices! Oh, and other than my flourless pecan sandies, I haven’t made any cookies yet either. I’ll make my brown sugar chocolate chip cookies, but cut-out cookie get saved for Valentine’s Day when life is slower; doing so just makes everything sweeter. 😉

I’m going to attempt this tomorrow subbing pumpkin for the coconut milk, as I’m out of any form of milk (except yogurt), and I’ve got pumpkin to use. That’ll make it a good sub for a breakfast, right?
I’ll let you know how it turns out.

Just because I promised to let you know how it went subbing pumpkin for the coconut milk:
Yes! It was wonderful!
I actually doubled the recipe as well, and baked it in a well-greased 11×14 pan without parchment paper and it turned out VERY moist and yummy! (No problems sticking, either.)